Yay for my family coming! Eight months is by far the longest amount of time I had ever gone without seeing them, so it was great to have them here!They got here on a Saturday night, but none of their luggage made it, so that was bad. Sunday we rested and hung around Bamako, and fortunately Sunday night all of the luggage came in.
Monday morning we headed out to the village. In Mali, it is VERY important to have a Malian name, which no one in my family had. Within minutes of entering the village, they people in the village realized my family didn't have Malian names, and sent out to find the right people to name my family.
We were sitting talking to someone and a tiny, energetic, old lady ran up to my mom and started hollering her new name ( Bintu something). Poor Mama had no idea what was going on so we explained to her that this was her new name. Then the lady started dancing and singing "Togoma! Togoma! Togoma!" which means, namesake. Mama was then forced to get up and dance with the lady and they danced around and clapped for a while. If there was anything from the past 8 months that I would like to have on video is was that.Then is was Sarah's turn (not as funny, but she had to dance) then Elizabeth's. 3 different women were chosen to name them then their family members came up and told them things like, you're my mom because you were named after my mom, it was quite a big deal. Daddy and Jonathan got new names too. The weird thing was that they did not
give any of them the same last name, even though we're all family. Every person has a different last name. I guess they wanted to give as many people the chance to be "togomas" as possible.The first village we were in was incredible because God is really, really working there. 2 journeygirls lived there for 2 years and when they left there were six believers. In the eight months since they left, that number has grown to 55. The believers are so bold and passionate. They are going around and sharing the gospel and forming their own church. They are desperate to have someone come teach them so they can know more. Unfortunately, in this village, my mom fell and fractured her wrist and Elizabeth got a stomach bug. Too bad.
We only spent one night in that village, so the next afternoon we headed to the next village. Fortunately for us, this was a big week for that village. Not only did they have a new baby, so there was a baby naming party coming up, but there was also
a wedding! To make it even better, both parties were for one man. His first wife had just had this baby, and he was about to take a second wife. Big week for him. Everyone was really excited. They had a pounding party complete with a singer. She sang for us, "White people can buy cars, white people can buy cell phones, white people can buy food, white people can buy (anything you can think of) but they can't buy children." I have no idea why she sang this, but she did, and made us all to dance to the song.We spent 2 nights in that village, then came back to Bamako. The Africans
were all very impressed to meet an entire white family, it was really funny. It was such a great time, I'm so glad they came!
